


Such a Fool to Hold You

by wildwinterwitch



Series: Driftwood [10]
Category: Broadchurch, True Love (TV)
Genre: Crossover, F/M, Series 1 Episode 6
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-14
Updated: 2013-04-14
Packaged: 2017-12-08 11:16:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,976
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/760731
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wildwinterwitch/pseuds/wildwinterwitch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alec makes a peace offering.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Such a Fool to Hold You

**Author's Note:**

> title from “I’m a Fool to Want You” by Billie Holiday

He brought her coffee. He was standing outside the school gates, ignoring the hostile glances, the not-so subtle snide remarks and the hissing of the pupils as they left after the last period of the day. She wondered how he could put up with it; she hadn’t been able to, and had run, Karen with her.

“Hey you,” she said, walking up to him, tightening her grip around the straps of her bag.

“Hey.” There was a tentative smile. “I thought you could do with some of the proper stuff. If the brew at the school compares at all to what we have at the station, that is.”

She accepted the paper cup and sipped the coffee appreciatively. “It’s all instant coffee in there. It gives you something to hold on to and a reason to sit down and have a chat, but it's not what I'd call coffee. Thanks.”

His smile became more confident. “My pleasure. Shall we walk?”

She nodded, adjusting the strap of her bag again, thinking of the card inside, painted, this time. She was glad that he’d come and offered her coffee. She’d have left him harsh words if he hadn’t.

“I have an idea of who K is,” he began eventually, walking towards the church and the beach path leading back to the harbour. It was going to be a long walk, and there’d be no running.

She ducked her head and studied the white lid of the paper cup. She was tired and she didn’t know if she could do this, not after a long day at school.

“But I am not the Detective Inspector when we talk,” he said.

“What are you telling me?” She needed him to say it.

“I want _you_ to tell me who K is. Was. When you’re ready.”

She bit her lip.

“I’m sorry for your loss,” he continued. “I haven’t checked, but there is something about you, Holly, that makes it obvious you’ve lost K.”

She sipped the coffee and wished it were still hot enough to burn her tongue. “I have,” she said softly. They had reached St Bede’s and passed it by on their way to the cliff. She caught Alec glance at the graveyard.

“K’s not here,” she said.

“Neither is…” he began. “Bloody hell. What are ye doing to me, woman?”

“I could ask you the same.” She didn’t have to ask to know who wasn’t in that graveyard either. They were back to their old deal.

They walked on in silence.

“So,” he said as they stood on the cliff top, where the wind bit their skin and tore at their hair. It was beginning to feel a little like the pins and needles it did in winter, and Holly shuddered at the idea of the season.

“So?”

“We could go looking for these, if that’s all right,” he said, digging for something in his coat pocket and producing the yellow piece of sea glass.

“You’ve still got it,” she whispered, the wind tearing the weak words from her lips.

“Sorry, what?” He leaned down and she could smell him, a memory of the soap he used, fading now as the day neared its end.

She stared at him, tilting her head towards him. They were close enough to each other for a kiss. Her heart began to start beating faster, and she wondered if they could have a second chance. “You’ve still got it,” she repeated, her eyes fixed on his bottom lip. She reached up to touch it, driven by a sudden need to make sure he was really there with her, that she hadn’t just imagined their walk. His lip was soft but the skin was a bit dry, and cracked. She looked up at him and saw his gaze fixed on her. “Is this all right?”

He grunted his response, unwilling to move his lips away from her touch.

“If I kiss you it’ll taste of coffee,” she said, brushing the pad of her thumb over his pliant flesh.

He plucked her hand from his lip and pulled it against his chest as he leaned in to kiss her. It was tentative at first, hoping and seeking permission for more. He tasted of tea and milk and sugar, and just the way she remembered him. She could feel the puffs of his breath against her cheek as he withdrew.

“Not too bad,” he said, giving her hand between them a squeeze. “Ye’re freezing.”

“It is a bit cold up here,” she said, gasping as a gust of wind stole her breath.

He held up the piece of sea glass out to her and she took it, brushed her thumb over it. It was smooth and warm. “Then let’s go down to the beach and see if we can find more of these on our way back.”

She nodded, slipping the shard into her pocket to keep it warm.

Carefully, they walked down the narrow cliff path. At one point, she stopped to take in the view. Alec was behind her, and suddenly she felt his long fingers tangle in her hair as he reached for the billowing mass in the wind. A moment later, she felt his breath on her cheek as he leaned towards her. “I love your hair. Holly.”

She shivered.

Then she pressed on, acutely aware of his presence behind her. If he planned to take her back to his hotel room, she’d go with him.

On the beach, they walked with their heads down because of the wind and to look for pieces of sea glass. She watched the tips of their shoes push forward in the pebbly sand, squeezing the water out of it as they shifted their weight. The sea was angry and grey, and they couldn’t go down far enough to pick up the offerings of the waves without getting soaked. The wind was just as icy down here, and it stole her breath once or twice more. By the time they reached the trailer park, Holly was frozen to the bone. They hadn’t found a single piece of sea glass, but that was all right. She reckoned they had found something more important.

Laughing in surprise that she’d carried the empty container the whole time, she dumped it into the first bin she saw. Alec did the same with his.

“What now, Miss?” he asked.

Dusk was beginning to settle on the town.

“I don’t know about you, Inspector, but I am hungry,” she said. She’d wanted to say that she was cold, but she noticed that the hunger pains were worse. Lunch had been a salad and a biscuit and she’d not had anything since then.

“Same here.”

They went to one of the friendlier pubs and ordered the rich, creamy lentil soup of the day with crusty homemade bread. Neither the patrons nor the owners paid them much attention. Holly wasn’t sure what she had expected to happen. The newspaper article had been published so long ago it wasn’t real any more. The children’s reaction to his presence at the school gate came back to mind. They certainly were unforgiving.

After the soup, Alec bought them dessert, and the helping was so big that they barely managed to finish it together. “You don’t each much, do you?” she asked.

“Not really hungry.”

“I don’t want to be by myself tonight,” she said.

His eyes widened.

“But I’d like a hot bath. I’m icy.”

He reached across the table for her hand and closed his fingers around it. His warmth was a shock, and Holly realised how cold she really was. “I have only one chapter left in my book, but I don’t want to be by myself tonight either.”

“Sounds like we have a deal?” she said, freeing her thumb and brushing it over his prominent knuckles.

“Aye.” He stood abruptly, and when she stared at him in surprise she could see that he was hardening at the idea of spending another night together. Without the running, this time. Thankfully, the walk to the Trader’s was a short one.

-:-

It was little wonder she was cold. She was wearing a short skirt and boots, her skin shimmering through the black of her tights. Her coat wasn't even as long as her skirt. Dipping his knees, he reached down to touch her knee, and it did feel cold. Straightening, he slid his hand up her thigh, bunching up the thick denim material of her skirt as he went. Even her thighs were cold, but when she shivered he was quite sure it wasn’t just from the cold.

He leaned in for a kiss. As they deepened it, he gently pushed her against the wall, brushing his fingers over the material of her tights and knickers. She gasped and reached for his belt, but he quickly grabbed her hands and lifted them above her head, pressing them against the wall.

“You are shivering,” he whispered, breathing kisses all over her face, brushing her nose with his. Bloody hell, even her nose was cold. He couldn’t make love to her like that.

Bloody hell.

Make love? Where had that come from?

“Alec?” she asked, looking up at him, concern reflected in her eyes.

He had broken the spell himself when he’d listened to his own words. Hadn’t he asked her not to think so much when they’d first fucked? He’d meant to seduce her slowly by playing on the shivering with cold and shivering with arousal image, but that wasn’t going to work any more.

“You really are cold, Holly. There’s a tub in the bathroom,” he said.

“Really?”

He looked at her in surprise.

“I’m sorry, Alec, I —”

Anger flashed up inside him, irrational anger. “Did you think I’d just fuck you? Like the last time, and send you away after?”

He watched the muscles in her throat work as she swallowed. “You didn’t send me away. And it wasn’t just a fuck.”

He stared at her.

“Not to me, it wasn’t. It’s why I fled like I did. I told you. It got too much for me.”

“Because of K.” He couldn’t fucking stop himself from destroying this second chance as well. What the hell was wrong with him?

She lifted her chin. “Yes.”

The deep breath he took was scented with her perfume and smells of work and their walk by the sea. “What was it if it wasn’t just a fuck?”

“It was a lifeline.”

“A kite string,” he couldn’t stop correcting. He felt more like a that to her than a lifeline.

“Yeah.”

His heart started pounding and he let go of her hands where he'd been pinning them above her head. His other hand, however, stayed where it was, feeling her become increasingly warm and damp.

Holly took the chance to wrap her arms around his neck and to kiss him. It was the first time that she had initiated the kiss, and it felt slightly different. It was as if she were making sure that the kite string was strong enough. His eye fluttered shut and he let her plunder and caress his mouth. She did both, moving from exploring to possessing.

“I’m still cold,” she said when she eventually let him go.

“Undress me,” he said. “I’d like to share a bath with you. If that’s okay.”

“It is, if you share that last chapter with me.”

He nodded and let go of her, his fingers feeling cold as he let go of their warm resting place. Holly brushed his coat off his shoulders and he expected her to drop it on the floor and leave it where it fell, but she caught it and hung it up carefully. Then she dropped to her knees to remove his shoes and socks. Rising, she unbuckled his trousers and pulled them down, making sure to avoid his hardening cock as she did. Then she rose to take off his jacket and shirt, pulled his vest over his head and knelt again to take off his pants, carefully holding the elastic away from his stomach so she didn’t hurt him. He was fully erect by that time.

“Holly.”

Without warning, she took him into her mouth, one hand at the base of his cock, the other cupping his bum.

“Holly!” he cried. He hadn’t meant for her to do that, hadn’t even hoped she would. He’d just wanted to spice things up a little.

She wouldn’t stop, and she did things with her tongue and lips that must be illegal until he exploded in her mouth gazing into her amber eyes, darkened by her own desire. He dropped forwards to support himself against the wall with his forearms, breathing hard and smiling giddily. This was easily the best blow job he’d ever had.

“Better now?” she asked, glancing up, her hands on his hips.

“Aye,” he croaked. “But I suppose you won’t believe me if I told you that that wasn’t what I had in mind when I asked you to undress me.”

“Maybe.” She smiled cheekily, licking her lips.

He swallowed. “Do you want to have a bath or sex?” he asked.

“Both, in that order.”

“Too bad I’ll have to run the bath first.”

He undressed her in the bathroom as the tub filled. When he was done, he knelt before her as she had before him, and licked and sucked her. Her taste was a bit more pungent this time, but it was her all right. The feel of her smooth skin on his tongue sent shivers of delight all over his body. As he ran his hands over her thighs and bum he noticed how cold her skin still was, and he did his best to make her come quickly so they could warm up in the bath. There was always time for more, and less hurried, later.

“Alec,” she moaned, shifting to give him better access, her hand in his hair. “Alec, please, please let me go, please let me…”

He wasn’t sure if he was hurting her or if there was anything else he’d done wrong, so he let go of her so he could look up at her. She cupped his cheek and smiled at him. “Why did you stop?”

She explained herself before he could ask.

“I… Oh, I wanted… When I said let me go I was asking you to make me come.”

He nodded, turning off the taps quickly and gesturing for her to sit on the edge of the tub, spreading her thighs. He brushed his flat tongue over her folds and then narrowed it to tease her clit. Her hold on his hair strengthened and she moaned his name, repeating her request to let her go. Just as he flicked his tongue over her clit he pushed and curled a finger inside her. She cried out something unintelligible and he quickly rose to catch her.

The movement dizzied him so he sat on the edge of the tub with her, holding her as she recovered. He thought, idly, that he needed his medication, and how small Holly felt in his arms. And how cold.

“Get in the tub, Miss, I’ll be there in a moment,” he whispered, kissing her temple. Looking in the mirror, he saw his stubble glistening in the harsh light of the bathroom, and he quickly wiped it, sneaking two pills into his mouth.

Holly settled in the tub, moving to one end so there was plenty of room for him to slide into the water behind her. He drew her back against his chest once he’d made himself comfortable, and while the idea of sharing the bath with her was the reason for his earlier lashing out, he now realised that her body against his was exactly what he needed.

“Thank you,” Holly said. “That was wonderful. But you didn’t have to reciprocate.”

“It’s all I’ve wanted to do since your cards started arriving,” he blurted.

She picked up his hand and played with it, pressing their palms against each other. “What are we going to do, Alec?”

He sighed. “I’m not sure.”

“I didn’t think I’d be able to rush into another relationship so soon after K.”

“Do you feel it’s too soon?” he asked carefully, his heart starting to pound again.

“I’m not sure. Being with you feels good. I… have this sense that… that we understand each other. That we _get_ each other.”

“Even if we don’t talk about personal things,” he added. She was right. “So. That make us… what? Friends?”

“With benefits.”

“Fuck buddies?”

She snorted but sobered quickly. “No. It’s more than that. But I can’t put my finger on it.” Again, she smoothed her hand against his palm, and this time he brought up the one that had been resting on her knee to sandwich her hand between his. He kissed the side of her head.

“Let’s just enjoy this and see where it leads,” he said. They both were cerebral people. If they overanalysed things now they might lose each other in the process. Besides, it was so good to let go of everything and to just be himself for a while. This inability to let go had destroyed his marriage, among other mistakes, not all of which were of his making.

“Tell me if it gets too much for you. The naked cuddling,” he whispered, letting go of their hands. He picked up a sponge and dipped it into the soapy water to wash her shoulders.

“I will.”

She turned in his embrace, her eyes full of words that weren’t ready to be voiced yet. She kissed him, having spotted something in his eyes, to make them flutter shut. He decided that he wasn’t afraid of losing himself in Holly, he found. So he let go.


End file.
